Interview with Mathias Lilja
(July 2004)
1
Mathias,
how did you get into garage punk and generally 60’s music?
Well, I guess it started off by going thru my
old mans record collection, he had a lot of the old 60´s stuff like; Cream,
Hendrix and Doors. I really liked it and went back to discover the earlier
records by the Yardbirds, Stones and Pretty Things. I´ve always been a huge fan of old
R´n´B and blues
like Bo Diddley, Howlin´Wolf etc.
Then
I met some older guys who had a band called the Spades (named after early
Elevators) who I thought were real cool. And they tought that me and my friends
were strange little kids to like 60´s music. Other boys at our age
probably listened to New kids on the block or whatever. They gave us booze and
played us bands like the Sonics and the Seeds and all of the compilation
albums, Back from the grave, Pebbles and that just blew my mind.
That
was it! All the american bands sounded
much rougher, wilder and harder than what I´d heard before and when
you´re like 14 or 15 or so that´s what you want. That was real teenage angst. Completly in tune with
how I felt.
2
Did
you play in any other band before the Strollers?
Yeah, sort of. Around -90/91 me and my
friends decided that dressing up in womens blouses and wide pants with sandals
and curl our hair with our mothers hair-thingie was a cool thing to do. We were
laughed at in school and probably
looked like we just stepped right out of
Saturday Night Fever. By then we had already formed a band and we called
ourselves the FreeForce, playing mostly Cream and Hendrix and other bluesy,
psychedelic type of things. We were a trio consisted of myself, Henrik Wind and
Martin Karlsson. But like I said, when garage-rock came along our pants got
tighter our moptop hair cuts began to take shape and we threw away the blouses
for turtle-necks instead. We were still laughed at though.
3
Ok,
so now tell me how did all started with the Strollers…
It all fell to place when we started
listening to garage music. The band was already there but we wanted a different
direction and a new name. We got a guy Jocke Dimberg from school to learn to
play the guitar, so by then the set was; two guitars,(me&jocke) bass(Henke)
and drums(Martin). Later on Jocke was to be replaced by a guy named Linus
Sallrot on Farfisa organ and when he left that´s when we brought Peter Kalin(bass)
in and Henke took over the organ. We took our name the Strollers from a
Yardbirds song and decided to play garage-rock and R´n´B and do our own material. And because no
one else wanted to sing, I took the challenge.
We started rehearse in my room in the
basement at my parents house, driving them nuts. My room was right beneath the
kitchen so the porcelain would rattle and bounce up and down on the kitchen
table. Well they were nice enough to let us be there but we made a hell of a
noise all around the block.
I
still remember my first attempt at singing. When I came back upstairs for
dinner my father yelled at me saying like "- What´s going on down there.
It sounds awful. You can´t be serious if you call
that singing. You must understand that you just don´t
have any talent, you´re just screaming!!".
By then I knew for sure I was gonna be the
singer of the band, ha ha.
4
Were
you inspired by the 80’s garage bands from your country, like the Crimson
shadows, the Stomachmouths, the Creeps and so on?
Oh yeah! I loved (still do) a lot of the 80´s stuff. The first
swedish 80´s band I heard was the Creeps I think. I
got the 1st record and was very inspired by R.Jeleniks singing. I think he´s the best singer to ever come out of sweden. And the Wylde Mammoths
were also at the top of our chart.
The Crimson Shadows and Stomachmouths they
became sort of legends in our eyes. Back then we didn´t know any of them in
person. We liked the Shadows because of their total insanity. They were the
wildest of them all. We heard stories about them(especially Jens) from our
older friends who knew them.
And we picked up on everything. Maybe that
wasn´t a
wise thing to do, looking at the self destructive side of it, but we felt a
connection there. Don´t give a shit about what
people think of you. If they don´t like your music;
fuck them. Some of em will soon enough and some of em will never understand.
Okay cool. I remember thinking at that time that we were the only real band
around. So we never felt connected with any of the other local bands. And for a
while that was a pretty good driving force. We stood on our own and wanted to
show everybody that we were the best. Or at least we tought so. Of course
nowadays you´re a little less angry and relaxed
about the whole thing. But to us as to many beeing a garage-rocker isn´t just about a hip image, you have to look like you mean it but you
also have to live it. And we sure did.
5
What
was your main inspiration, anyway?
All the american garage stuff. A lot of
swedish and dutch 60´s bands too. I don´t think it´s necessary to name-drop too much, but you had compilations like
Nuggets, Pebbles, B.F.T.G and so on. Remains, New Dawn, Sonics, Wailers,
Unrelated Segments were some of the bands we liked, along with a whole bunch of
others. The mod scene never appealed to me. I mean The Who is great but all the
mod caractares seemed so boring with their well pressed suits and dancing with
their little steps to northern soul. They just seemed so well behavied and
straight.
We
were teenage cavemen on a mission to drink booze and destroy. I think a lot of those
mod puritans was a bit dissapointed when they turned up to see us play and
there were four ugly long haired dirty bastards up there.
6
You
did two incredibly great 45s with the Strollers and then a great album too. Did
you get any attention by the press or radio shows by that time in Sweden or
abroad?
Well, we were sort of on the verge of making
a little breakthrough for a while.
When we released the 1st 45 the word started
spreading that there was a cool new band around and we did some gigs in Stockholm
and that led to some airplay. There´s a TV station in sweden called ZTV
who ran a short program about the band with some clips from a live show in our
home town of Örebro. Apart from having some songs played on the radio now
and then (also in Norway and Finland) the national radio did an half hour live
show with us.
After
that, if we´d worked for it a little more, maybe something bigger could´ve come out of it.
But
that was always the case with the Strollers. When we had an opportunity we
always blew it. Now looking back on it I think that if we´d put some effort and
work into things it could´ve gone kinda well. But we
never saw further than to the next bottle of beer. The day we were suppossed to
sign the contract for Low Impact they turned up with a six pack of beer for
each one of us and said "-Look, these beers are for you guys, but not
until you put your signatures on these papers". Ha, ha I think it took
about three seconds to sign that thing.
The strange thing about us though was that we
were always thought of as a bigger band than we actually were. Maybe because we
were a pretty good live band with pretty good original songs.
The attention we got was bigger compared to
other bands on the same level as us. I mean we didn´t have any promotion whatsoever.
7
You
should be possibly aware of the fact that your first two 45s are already rare
and hard to find. Do you like that or you would prefer your records to be easy
for anyone to get?
I think it´s kinda cool to know that some knucklehead
in japan is willing to pay like 80 dollars for a strollers single. However,
if Low Impact decides to press more
copys, which i doubt, that´s fine too. Of course you
want as many people as possible to hear your music. (Low Impact is a very nice
label. Just wanted to add that).
8
Where
did you play live?
We did a lot of gigs in Sweden. Some
festivals, some gigs in Norway, Finland and Denmark. And then we did this one
European tour going from Denmark through Germany, Holland, Belgium and Switzerland
wich went okay and we had pretty good
crowds at the gigs.
We
were supposed to go to New York for a garage festival they held there each year
in November.( can´t remember the name of it) We were actually the only band that didn´t have to do an audition to come and play. We also had some festival in
Spain booked. But like I said before our sense for organizing things wasn´t all that good so we never managed to raise the money for the trips.
9
Who
had the idea of putting out a record with Jens Lindberg?
He did. By that time we were good friends of
his and he liked the Strollers. He had just begin to write his moody stuff (the
seed to Maharajas) and said "- I got some songs that I´d like you guys to
record". And we said "sure". It was an honour to work with Jens
"the garage-rock legend" Lindberg, ha ha. I think it turned out
great. It was quite a different thing to what we were doing at the time. It was
a lot of fun.
10
The
1st album followed by ‘Captain Of My Ship’, which, in my
humble opinion, was weak and failed to continue what you started as garage punk
band. What happened?
Very humble of you, thanks he, he. But you´re right. It wasn´t a worthy follower to the 1st one. It´s
hard to point out a specific reason to why it didn´t
quite work. First of all the sound isn´t in favour
of the songs. We tried to make sort of a bigger sound than on the first one and
worked a lot on the drums. I guess we tried to make a kind of Sonicsy hard-
poundin´ big beat. In the end there were just drums
everywhere. It sounded like the fucking Rush-drummer had produced the record.
And we didn´t even notice it as we went along. And
so the whole sound just became a blur. Another thing was that the band was a
bit shattered. We didn´t know what we wanted to do. The
songwriting started to take some new turns. Not that we wanted to experiment
and do like 30 minutes psychedelic freak-outs or anything, but we were unsure
of where we were heading.
I
personally think we should´ve stuck to the old concept of just doing simple, fun and snotty garage
tunes. But some of us got bored I guess and wanted to do other things. Also
there were some tension beginning to appear that later made us split the band.
But anyhow I still think there´s some good songs on
that one. "Not Good Enough For You" is a pretty good and moody little
piece. The title track by Martin is alright. " I Don´t Care" was actually one of the first songs I ever wrote as an
angry teenager of 15/16 yrs. If it had the right sound and production that
allowed the songs to really come to surface, it´d be
a whole different thing I think.
11
Did
you have any other offers from other labels than Low Impact Records?
No not any serious offers as I recall. Maybe
the Low Impact guys knows more about that than me. I don´t know. We were supposed
to do something for Estrus. I don´t know why that
never happened. Low impact is a really small label but we were happy with it.
We got to make some records, you know. Get around and play, drink beer and have
fun. That´s what it took to keep us happy. And the
L.I. label has a good reputation for putting out cool records. The Maggots for
instance, a real cool band with Mans Mansson as you know who produced the
latest Maharajas record. And did a phenomenal job on that one.
12
I
know that you were supposed to put out another 45 too, on Screaming Apple
Records sometime. Why didn’t this one come out in the end?
Yeah, ha, ha right. This was around the time when
my favourite thing to do was to lock myself in the rehearsal room with a
twelve-pack of beer and some other substances and a portabel little recorder
that I´d got.
I
used to stay in there for like 24 hours in a row for weeks and just get loaded
and record things by myself.
Because there was no toilet down there I used to shit in little
plastic bags and tie them up, but that didn´t prevent the horrible stench from
spreading across the room. And I always forgot to bring them out when I was
leaving. Well, needless to say the guys that we were sharing the rehearsel room
with wasn´t happy about that at all.
Anyway we got an offer from Screaming Apple to give them two songs
for a single. And the only thing we had was the things that I had done down in
that basement. Among those was a song called "The Final Trip" and
another one called "Gotta Get Away". We sent it for mastering and I
was pleased with them. They were totaly insane and maybe for the most hardcore
garage/psychedelia nuts to appreciate.
And
so we sent them to this guy at Screaming Apple(don´t remeber his name) and
got an E-mail back saying like "-What the hell is this! I can´t release this crap. It´s just organ allover
the place". He didn´t like it. And that was
that. We never bothered to make a new recording for him and at the time I was
like -" Well if he doesn´t like it, screw
him!"
13
And
as I’m always open to any gossips, please tell me why did the Strollers split?
It´s not as dramatic as you would hope
for I guess. After our first/last European tour we came back to sweden to do a
final gig in örebro. But after the tour some of us was just fed up with
each other. Martin and I had a huge fight about a lot of things right when we
came back from the trip. At a gas station in denmark I think it was. I guess it was just things we´ve bottled up for so long that it all just exploded. When we got back
home we didn´t talk to each other for a few days
until finally I went over to his place and we straightened things up. I
apologized
for giving him a hard time. Back when we
started I was the self-proclaimed leader of the band and could be quite an ass
to the other guys. And things that you´ve done has a way of coming right
back at you. Anyway we called it a
truce and decided to do our last gig ever the
day before christmas 2000. Martin and I both had agreed that in order to keep
our friendship we had to stop playing together. I think Peter and Henrik didn´t really understand the
situation that Martin and I had and
they probably would´ve liked us to go on. And that
was it. Well almost. Due to the dept we had to our record company after the
tour we had to do a few more gigs to bring in some money. Later we did one more
final gig in Stockholm following year 28 dec.
14
Are
the other Strollers involved in any band now? What did you all do after you
called it a day?
Well, me as you know is with the Maharajas. I
joined them about, I don´t know, three years ago or so.
Martin has his own band now where he sings and play guitar called
Penny Arcade. The play kinda 70´s New York inspired punk. Like Dictators, the Dolls and stuff. I wouldn´t want to go too deep in what their influences are but I think I´m pretty close in describing what they sound like. And I´m happy for him because that´s one big
reason to why he wanted to leave the band. He always wanted to play guitar.
Even back when I more or less forced him to learn the drums and start playing
with Henrik and myself. So now he can do that and play the stuff that was a bit
out of frame for the Strollers.
Henrik plays electric piano and organ with a R´n´R band called Peepshows and from what I know writes most of their
material since he joined. He also played most of the instruments on a solo
record that the singer from a well known skate-punk band Millencolin did just
rescently. Henrik is really a multi-talented guy who plays almost everything so
I´m not surprised he was asked to hop in when Nicola
(Millencolins singer) made the solo record.
Me and Henrik see each other on a regular
basis and do gigs every week at a local bar playing old Byrds/Gram Parsons
songs and things like that. You know, selling a little butt to make a living.
And don´t worry, we keep away from the
obvious coversong-crap.
Peter is the one that I see the least. I know
he´s
been involved in some projects with the Roadrunners guys (another
Örebro-based band). But as far as I know he´s
not in any band at the moment. A shame though cause he´s a fucking awesome bassplayer.
15
What
exactly happened and you joined the Maharajas?
Me and Jens have been friends for some time
now and I ´ve always had my eye on what he´s been doing
through the years. It was the guys from Spades who knew him and introduced me
to him some years earlier.
I knew
he had an idea of putting a band together that would only play moody greek
inspired punk. Well actually the band had been around for some time and I liked
what they were doing. I think the band split up and reformed in various
constillations a couple of times. After the Strollers I was kind of sick of
beeing in a band but after a while, you know, I started to miss singing and
playing. I had no choice but to pick up the guitar again. I don´t remember if he asked
or I asked but I know he said it would be great if I could join in and sing for
them. Apart from the" Jens meets the Strollers" 45 I had never done
anything together with him so I was excited to be in the band.
16
I’ve
noticed that you did wrote many songs for the Maharajas 2nd album.
Are these from the Strollers era or only new?
Oh, I think you must have been misinformed
there. Actually I haven´t written one single song for the Maharajas. Jens & Ulf handles
that part of it. And they´re doing it great. The
thing is, when I was with the Strollers I did most of the song writing. And
that was a lot of fun but it can also be kind of a drag to feel like you´re the one pulling the whole musical machinery. If your inpiration runs
out and no one is there to fill that gap it gets kind of hard. I´m sure they would like it if I came along with some songs but it just
hasn´t happened yet.
But
when I joined the Maharajas I felt reliefed to be able to lean back and let
someone else take charge. And they were really enthusiastic on both writing and
playing so it was good to be in a vital band again. I still contribute with
arrangements on the songs and stuff. And I think that the vocal part has a lot
to do with how our songs turns out.
17
Which
are your plans for the future with the Maharajas?
Right now were working on some dates later on
this fall. Northern Spain in September and Holland in November. That will be
the first outside of Sweden gigs with Maharajas. Great to travel with older
experienced men who can calm me down when I freak out on the airplane ha, ha. I´m terrified of flying
but it´ll be great, especially Spain where I´ve never played before. Right now we´re
getting together to rehearse some new songs by Jens and Ulf and we´ll try to put a new record out as soon as we can. We´ll see how this one goes and hopefully Low Impact will let us do the
next one with them again.
18
What
music are you into now?
Part of it is same as always. The 60´s stuff. Alot of it is
great but nowadays the compilation albums that comes out is just things that
you´ve heard a million times on other records. And
once in a while if some obscure 60´s single appears
that no one´s heard, it´s
not always that good. All you need really is the volumes of Back from the
grave. And some Bo Diddley and Beatles records. And maybe the Rising Storm
record and some Barry and the Remains. That should make a great 60´s collection I think. Of course there´s a
lot more but I guess you know what I mean. I´m just
not that type of guy who sits around and collects records and jerk off to
serial numbers. I hear a good song, great. That doesn´t make it better if you spend 300 hundred dollars to get the original
singel. It´s the same song. And then I´ll record it from the one who bought it. For free!
But I listen to alot of other music too. I´m much into Americana
& alt.Country. Uncle Tupelo, Jayhawks, Whiskeytown etc. And rock and roll
in general. If someone comes up to me and ask me what kind of music I like I
say "-Rock and Roll."
19
Name
your favorite 5 albums and 5 45s, please
Okay,
Albums: the Beatles first five
45s : the Beatles first five
20
Do
you like any today garage bands of today?
Not many. Is there any proper garage band
around these days? I don´t know. I like the Giljoteens a lot. I don´t
really keep myself updated with the "scene"
Here
in sweden at least there´s so many bands popping up everywhere that are semi-garage and uses the
right instruments and everything but it feels like they´re just putting on a cool attitude. I´m just
sick of all these bands. To me it seems fake and like a lot of hot air.
Thanks Mathias!
[The Strollers
Discography] [The Stoneage Cavemen]
